Champion manager: Chinese Women's Super League will be more fierce

Chen Wanting, the manager who helped Jiangsu win the Chinese National Women's Football Championship in March, believes that the competitions in the new season of the Chinese Women's Super League will grow fiercer.

When Chen was appointed as the manager of Jiangsu in 2022, her priority was to keep the club from being relegated. Having gone through a series of difficulties including lack of sponsorship, foreign players and even enough backup players, Jiangsu beat Hainan 1-0 in the National Championship final to win the trophy on March 8.

"I'm excited about it because it's our first title," Chen said in an interview with Xinhua News Agency. "We reached the final last year, but couldn't send all of our starting players due to injuries and national team recruitment. So, we were proud enough of being the runners-up. We are better-prepared this time and we have a more complete roster. We targeted nothing but the trophy before the final."

In spite of winning the title, both Chen and her players were convinced that there's still room for improvement with their performance. They secured three straight wins at the group stage, but had to go through a penalty shoot-out against Chongqing to advance to the semifinals.

"After beating Chongqing, players didn't feel so good about it even though we reached the semifinals," Chen said. "We had a wrap-up meeting and reached the conclusion that we weren't mentally ready for tough games. We will play Beijing in the semifinals and that got us nervous."

Chen believes that the 1-0 win over Beijing in the semifinals was one of Jiangsu's best-performing game at the National Championship because players implemented well the tactics and worked as a well-functioning organization.

Jiangsu will play their next Women's Super League game with Chongqing on the road this weekend. Chen listed Wu Han, Shanghai and Beijing as their major opponents and admitted that there will be no easy game for any team.

Chen also told Xinhua that she's happy to see clubs now having access to detailed stats and wide-angle clips of the games. "I think it's good progress for the league to be willing to make this change," Chen told Xinhua. "It's a good change if clubs can improve their performances with the help of technologies and more direct stats."

"In the Women's Premier League, all clubs have superb teams for game analysis. But in our league, many clubs only have one person for the job," Chen said in the interview. "As a result, many of our players have okay skills, but problematic abilities to read the game and make (decisions) in the game."

"For example, you tell one player to make a long pass, she can do it. But if you ask her when and where she should do it, she may not be able to answer that. That's one of the biggest gaps between our players and the world's top ones. If we have clips to show our players, they will learn better when she should make the long pass. She may not learn it immediately, but she will pick it up after watching the clip more times," Chen added.